Jon McHann, 56, got started on prescription opioids the way a lot of adults in the U.S. did: he was in pain following an accident. In his case, it was a fall. “I hit my tailbone just right, and created a severe bulging disc” that required surgery, McHann says. McHann, who lives in Smithville, Tenn., expected to make a full recovery and go back to work as a heavy haul truck driver. But 10 years after his accident, he’s still at home

Jon McHann, 56, got started on prescription opioids the way a lot of adults in the U.S. did: he was in pain following an accident. In his case, it was a fall. “I hit my tailbone just right, and created a severe bulging disc” that required surgery, McHann says. McHann, who lives in Smithville, Tenn., expected to make a full recovery and go back to work as a heavy haul truck driver. But 10 years after his accident, he’s still at home

“After the surgery the pain was just excruciating,” McHann recalls. “I was unable to function.” His spinal problems turned out to be more complicated and hard to treat. And he developed other health problems, too. He had several more surgical procedures for his back, but he got no relief. He says on days when his pain is through the roof, “I can’t open my eyes because I know if I blink it’s going to hurt.”

His doctor prescribed methadone, a powerful opioid. He stayed on the drug for seven years.

“It helped immensely, it brought my pain down to a 5 or 6 [on a 10 point scale],” McHann says. “I could function fairly well throughout the day. I could go to church every weekend, I could help my wife shop, I could help around the house a little bit.”

Another lawmaker is asking insurers whether their policies have made it easier for patients to access cheaper, more addictive drugs over less addictive alternatives. Meanwhile, the insurance industry trade group pledged additional steps to combat inappropriate prescribing

Another lawmaker is asking insurers whether their policies have made it easier for patients to access cheaper, more addictive drugs over less addictive alternatives. Meanwhile, the insurance industry trade group pledged additional steps to combat inappropriate prescribing

Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Md., the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, wrote to the companies after an article by ProPublica and The New York Times found that insurance companies sometimes favor cheaper, more addictive opioids over less addictive, but more expensive, alternatives.

“This is not a hypothetical problem,” Cummings wrote. “In my home state of Maryland, 550 people died of an overdose in the first three months of 2017 alone. Synthetic opioids like fentanyl are driving up the epidemic’s death toll, but prescription opioids contribute significantly to this crisis by fostering addiction and causing fatal overdoses.”

Welcome to the interactive version of “Pregnant Women & the Zika Virus Vaccine Research Agenda: Ethics Guidance on Priorities, Inclusion, and Evidence Generation” by the Ethics Working Group on ZIKV and Pregnancy. Its structure mirrors that of the static version of the guidance, but it’s been enriched with additional links and resources, and broken into expandable sections for ease of reading and reference. Use the navigation at the left side of the page to skip from section to section, or scroll and click “read more” to expand each section on the right.

Guidance is organized around three overarching imperatives to ensure the ethical inclusion of the interests of pregnant women in the ZIKV vaccine research agenda and across the product life cycle:

to pursue and prioritize development of ZIKV vaccines that will be acceptable for use by pregnant women;

to collect data to inform judgments about safety and efficacy of administration in pregnancy; and

to ensure pregnant women have fair access to participate in ZIKV vaccine trials that offer a reasonably favorable balance of potential benefits to research-related risks.

“A crippling problem.” “A total epidemic.” “A problem like nobody understands.” These are the words President Trump used to describe the opioid epidemic ravaging the country during a White House listening session in March

“A crippling problem.” “A total epidemic.” “A problem like nobody understands.” These are the words President Trump used to describe the opioid epidemic ravaging the country during a White House listening session in March

The percentage of people in the U.S. dying of drug overdoses has effectively quadrupled since 1999, and drug overdoses now rank as the leading cause of death for Americans under 50.

Drugs do exist to reverse opioid overdoses or treat long-term opioid addiction. But while opioids have become easier and easier to obtain through illicit markets and sellers on the dark web, a drug that could save countless lives has become increasingly out of reach.

Consider the addiction treatment drug, Suboxone. Patents and other exclusivities on the basic version of Suboxone expired some time ago, yet the price remains sky-high, and access problems persist. Oral film strips now cost over US$500 for a 30-day supply; even simple tablets cost a whopping $600 for a 30-day supply. The cost alone puts the medication out of reach for many.

If nothing is done, we can expect a lot of people to die: A forecast by STAT concluded that as many as 650,000 people will die over the next 10 years from opioid overdoses — more than the entire city of Baltimore. The US risks losing the equivalent of a whole American city in just one decade.

That would be on top of all the death that America has already seen in the course of the ongoing opioid epidemic. In 2015, more than 52,000 people died of drug overdoses in America — about two-thirds of which were linked to opioids. The toll is on its way up, with an analysis of preliminary data from the New York Times finding that 59,000 to 65,000 likely died from drug overdoses in 2016.

If you want to understand how we got here, there’s one simple explanation: It’s much easier in America to get high than it is to get help.

According to new genetic evidence published today, public health efforts to contain and fight the disease could have—and should have—gotten underway much sooner. Zika, it turns out, had established itself in Brazil as early as 2013

According to new genetic evidence published today, public health efforts to contain and fight the disease could have—and should have—gotten underway much sooner. Zika, it turns out, had established itself in Brazil as early as 2013

IN APRIL 2015, researchers in Brazil reported the first case of Zika virus—finally putting a name to the mysterious rash, fever, and joint pain-causing illness that had been swarming the northeast corner of the country. By the time the World Health Organization declared Zika a global health emergency nearly a year later, the outbreak had spread to 26 countries and territories in the Americas, infecting hundreds of thousands of people and leaving many babies with an incurable developmental defect called microcephaly.

Since then, researchers have been racing to develop treatments and vaccines, the first of which entered mid-stage human trials at the end of March. But according to new genetic evidence published today, public health efforts to contain and fight the disease could have—and should have—gotten underway much sooner.

Zika, it turns out, had established itself in Brazil as early as 2013.

The revelation comes from the same group of seasoned virus sleuths who used genetics to help stop Ebola’s spread through Sierra Leone in 2014. This time, they sequenced more than 100 new Zika genomes, taken from patients and mosquitoes throughout the Americas. They traced the virus’s spread from Brazil to the nations next door, into the Caribbean and then the US. The reconstructed genetic history, published in threeseparateNature papers, could help drug developers look for a cure, and public health officials develop containment strategies. But mostly, they make a strong case for developing a genetics-based global surveillance system so that the next outbreak—whether it’s Zika or something else—doesn’t shake the world quite so hard.

Inside a community on the front lines of the opioid epidemic. Officer Sean Brinegar arrived at the house first — “People are coming here and dying,” the 911 caller had said — and found a man and a woman panicking. Two people were dead inside, they told him

Inside a community on the front lines of the opioid epidemic. Officer Sean Brinegar arrived at the house first — “People are coming here and dying,” the 911 caller had said — and found a man and a woman panicking. Two people were dead inside, they told him

Brinegar, 25, has been on the force in this Appalachian city for less than three years, but as heroin use has surged, he has seen more than his fair share of overdoses. So last Monday, he grabbed a double pack of naloxone from his gear bag and headed inside.

A man was on the dining room floor, his thin body bluish-purple and skin abscesses betraying a history of drug use. He was dead, Brinegar thought, so the officer turned his attention to the woman on a bed. He could see her chest rising but didn’t get a response when he dug his knuckle into her sternum.

Brinegar gave the woman a dose of injected naloxone, the antidote that can jumpstart the breathing of someone who has overdosed on opioids, and returned to the man. The man sat up in response to Brinegar’s knuckle in his sternum — he was alive after all — but started to pass out again. Brinegar gave him the second dose of naloxone.

Another bird flu is on the rampage in China. Already this winter there have been 424 cases in humans, more than a third of all those identified since the virus emerged in 2013. And it is spreading. This week it was announced that it seems poised to acquire mutations that could make it a much worse problem

Another bird flu is on the rampage in China. Already this winter there have been 424 cases in humans, more than a third of all those identified since the virus emerged in 2013. And it is spreading. This week it was announced that it seems poised to acquire mutations that could make it a much worse problem

H7N9 first started infecting people in China in 2013. Like its cousin H5N1, the virus that drew attention to bird flu in 2004, it mainly infects birds and doesn’t readily pass from human to human – but should it acquire this ability a deadly pandemic could ensue.

H7N9 seems to jump to people from poultry more easily than H5N1, staging regular winter outbreaks in the last 4 years. By mid-2016 there were 798 known cases, and around 40 per cent of the people died. But since last October alone, there have been 424, the most ever seen in one season – and it isn’t over yet.

“I suspect the spike in cases of H7N9 is real,” says Malik Peiris of Hong Kong University, and not due to better diagnosis. He thinks the jump is due to an increase in poultry infections. Tests in poultry markets are finding H7N9 more often, he says, and it is spreading: this winter has seen human cases in 18 provinces of mainland China, including for the first time in southern Yunnan province, and it could spread to Vietnam from there.